Treat Your Candidates Like Customers for a Better Candidate Experience

Job seekers essentially “shop” around for the right job. They look through job ad after job ad to find the position that sounds just right. Candidates are the customers of your recruitment department; recruiters have to fundamentally sell the role to acquire their desired talent pool… their target market. In order to build a better candidate experience, think about the candidates as customers. Look for yourself at some stats that indicate how important calculated recruitment efforts are.

14.4% of candidates say company values were the principal marketing material that influenced their application.

Customers might like the design of a particular product, but how does it actually work? The values of a company are just as important (if not more important) as the work that comes out of it in terms of attracting candidates. Currently, there’s a divide among hiring professionals whether hiring for cultural fit is more important than hiring for functional fit.

Regardless of how you hire, there are still ways to better attract candidates. Marketing company values is crucial to the recruiting strategy. An office might be fun, but is it actually conducive to growth or development? Jenn Steele (@jennsteele), former Head of Growth at RecruitLoop, said:

“Other than the fact that obsessing about beer might signify a larger problem, this research confirms something that we’re seeing with our clients - beer doesn’t do much to attract good candidates… Instead, it’s that the obsession with creating a fun, funky culture means quite a bit less than an obsession with being honest and transparent with candidates.”

While this is a consumer statistic, it makes sense when it is translated to a recruiting perspective. Job seekers are more likely to post a negative candidate experience to their social media platform of choice than they are a positive one. This is why it’s essential to actively address and respond to negative experiences in a timely manner to rectify any poor impressions. Even better, establish a candidate experience from the beginning to avoid the negativity.

So why is it so important to foster a positive candidate experience for your candidates? It helps the organization in the long run - it’s not just to make the company look nice. A positive candidate experience increases productivity: 15% of candidates who have a positive hiring experience are more likely to put in more effort in their new job. Not to mention it helps to increase retention with 38% of candidates stating they are more likely to stay with their new employer.

Companies research candidates through social media platforms like Twitter and LinkedIn before they make hiring decisions. Just the same, job seekers are told it’s good practice to research the organizations they apply to. It’s hard for them to do so, however, if you don’t provide background information. Like consumers, candidates want to know the background of a company before they “buy” into the culture.

Candidates shop around for the job that best fits their developmental needs. Recruiters, ultimately, have to sell the positions to the candidates and simultaneously have to uphold company standards for candidate experience during the recruitment process. Similar to a consumer base, the roles have to be marketed with hints of company culture.

Because job seekers are typically encouraged to research the organization they apply to, not providing background information can prove to be detrimental to candidate attraction efforts. By creating an employer brand that encapsulates a positive candidate experience, recruiters have a hand in increasing productivity and retention.

As ClearCompany's HR Business Partner, Laura focuses on all things HR including managing employee benefits, onboarding and engagement initiatives. With a keen focus on best-practices, she serves as a strategic partner to the leadership team by acting as a trusted resource on a wide variety of human resources topics including policy interpretation, creating and recommending enhancements to the HR process, and career development.